1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mixing recorder and a control method for the same which enable the user to produce music by inputting an audio signal via a microphone or the like while monitoring a recorded audio signal, and mixing the input audio signal and the recorded audio signal, as well as to a program for implementing the control method.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, musical apparatuses with enhanced portability have been realized due to the advance of the audio compression technique and the miniaturization technique of electronic components. For example, in a portable MP3 player which employs the audio compression technique of MP3, a WAV file formed by digitally sampling an audio signal generated by performance of a piece of music and/or singing of a song is encoded in the MP3 format, and the resulting file compressed in the MP3 format is stored in a flash memory or the like, thereby enabling users to enjoy the reproduction of the recorded piece of music and/or song, away from home, e.g. outdoors.
Further, a portable karaoke apparatus disclosed e.g. in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 2000-338984 is capable of extending and reproducing an audio signal file encoded and stored in the MP3 format, and at the same time mixing an audio signal of a human voice input via a microphone with the reproduced audio signal for audio reproduction, thereby enabling users to enjoy a desired karaoke performance away from home.
These apparatuses are all intended for reproduction or playback, and do not record or store audio signals input via a microphone or the like. However, these apparatuses include a type which is capable of recording and storing audio signals. For example, a portable MP3 recorder has been proposed which is equipped with an analog input terminal, and is capable of performing A/D (Analog-to-Digital) conversion of an audio signal input via the analog input terminal from a cassette tape recorder, a radio receiver, or the like, and then encoding the resulting digital audio signal in the MP3 format, to store the compressed file as an audio signal file.
However, the portable MP3 recorder of this type is not capable of performing “recording with mixing (overdubbing)” in which a number of input signals are multiplexed. As a musical apparatus capable of recording with mixing, a double radio-cassette player, for example, is known. In the double radio-cassette player, it is possible to reproduce musical tones from one cassette tape, and at the same time mix an audio signal of the reproduced musical tones and an audio signal input via a microphone or an external input terminal, to record the mixed audio signals in the other cassette tape in a multiplexing manner.
In the double radio-cassette player, however, when the mixing is repeatedly carried out, dubbing of analog signals of musical tones is repeatedly carried out, resulting in seriously degraded sound quality of the resulting audio signal file. Therefore, this apparatus is not suitable for music production.
Further, in the double radio-cassette player, when the mixing is carried out a number of times, some mixing results may be obtained in the process of mixing before the last mixing result is obtained. In the double radio-cassette player, however, information on e.g. the condition of mixing (for example, how many times the mixing have been carried out) and the property and contents of a piece of music cannot be added to each of the mixing results obtained in the process of mixing, and hence particularly when the user wishes to reuse mixing results obtained in the process of mixing, he/she cannot easily find out the mixing results from a large number of mixing results.